`84 riots: Witness heard cries of people throughout night

New Delhi: A woman witness, who lost five of
her family members, including the husband and a son during the
1984 anti-Sikh riots, on Thursday claimed before a court conducting
trial against Congress leader Sajjan Kumar that she had heard
cries of people throughout a night.

"I kept praying throughout the night. During the night, I
could hear the cries of people who were being brought out and
attacked in that part of Raj Nagar where the incharge of the
police post had gone and could also see smoke rising from that
area. I also heard the sound of firing," Jagdish Kaur told
Additional Sessions Judge Sunita Gupta.
The 69-year-old witness was being cross examined for the
seventh day in a row during the on-going trial against Kumar
and others.

"Thereafter, some noble human beings came to me and told
me that the dead bodies were lying for the last three days and
the bodies would decompose and asked me as to what should be
done to the bodies," Kaur said.

The witness, who was confronted with her previous
affidavit submitted before Justice G T Nanavati Commission
which inquired the sequence of events leading to the riots,
was found to have made some "improvements" as pointed out by
counsel for accused Anil Kumar Sharma during her cross
examination.

Kaur, who came to the national capital from Amritsar to
depose in the case, narrated the turn of events as to how she
went to Cantonment area to seek help as her husband Kehar
Singh worked in the MES of Indian Army.

She also claimed that she had gone to the police station
along with an Army officer but nothing came out of it.
Meanwhile, senior counsel H S Phoolka, appearing on behalf
of the victims, pointed out to the court that the cross
examination of Kaur, who suffered from high blood pressure,
was being dragged too long as it was the seventh day of the
proceedings.

Kaur`s cross examination remained inconclusive and would
resume tomorrow.

Kaur had on July 3 identified Kumar and his nephew
Khokkar, and other accused Girdhari Lal and Captain Bhagmal as
accomplices who had allegedly instigated mobs during the 1984
carnage.

Kaur`s family members were killed in the riots that had
followed the assassination of Indira Gandhi on October 31,
1984.

CBI had filed two chargesheets against Kumar and others on
January 13 in the riots cases registered in 2005 on the
recommendation of Nanavati Commission.